Listeriosis is a rare but serious infection, usually caused by eating food contaminated with the bacterium Listeria monocytogenes (Lm).  The disease primarily affects older adults, pregnant women, newborns, and people with weakened immune systems.  As described in a 2013 Technical Report, the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) worked with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in consultation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on an “Interagency Risk Assessment: Listeria monocytogenes in Retail Delicatessens.”  FSIS incorporated key findings into its 2014 FSIS Best Practices Guidance for Controlling Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) in Retail Delicatessens that outlines steps retailers can take to prevent certain ready-to-eat (RTE) foods prepared or sliced in retail delicatessens and consumed in the home, such as deli meats and salads, from becoming contaminated with Lm and thus a source of listeriosis. 

USDA’s June 23, 2023 Constituent Update announces that FSIS has updated its Best Practices Guidance for Controlling Listeria monocytogenes in Retail Delicatessens in response to USDA-FSIS Retail Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) Focus Group Findings and the National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection (NACMPI) recommendations.  Changes include updated references to the FDA Food Code, relocation of a Deli Self-Assessment Tool to the appendices, and a new glossary, as well as edits to improve readability, such as replacing a summary of the Interagency Risk Assessment with a hyperlink to the report itself.  FSIS also added new sections: Sources of Listeria in Retail Firms, Active Managerial Control, and Risk Mitigation of Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) in Retail Firms.  Additionally, reflecting more recent scientific knowledge, the updated guidance no longer includes a recommendation that retailers should rotate (change) sanitizers. 

FSIS considers the guidance to be practical recommendations that retailers can follow to control Lm contamination and outgrowth in the deli that will help ensure RTE meat and poultry products in the deli area are handled under sanitary conditions and are not adulterated.  While geared toward assisting small businesses with compliance, FSIS states that deli departments in large supermarkets can benefit from the information in this guideline as well.